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After you receive the award letters from each school, make sure you carefully review all the different types of aid they're offering. Many schools front-load their packages with loans rather than grants or scholarships. Look specifically for: 1. Free money (grants and scholarships) that doesn't need to be repaid 2. Work-study opportunities 3. Subsidized loans (government pays interest while in school) 4. Unsubsidized loans (interest accrues immediately) 5. Parent PLUS loans (these are in the parent's name) Some schools make their packages look generous by including large Parent PLUS loan amounts, so be careful when comparing offers.
This is incredibly helpful advice - thank you! I'll make sure we're comparing apples to apples when the packages arrive. Definitely prefer grants over loans if possible.
also u need to be super careful abt deadlines for accepting aid. some schools have different deadlines for accepting admission vs accepting financial aid. my brother almost lost his aid package cuz he didn't realize he had to accept it separately from accepting admission
Oh wow, I had no idea! I'll make sure we check for separate deadlines. This whole process is so much more complicated than when I went to college.
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lol its actually kinda genius of ur ex if he knows what hes doing. if hes higher income and does the FAFSA ur kid will get less aid. if u do it with lower income they might get more. maybe hes actually trying to help? just saying its possible
Trust me, he's not trying to help. He's been financially manipulative throughout our divorce. I think he's trying to create confusion or possibly sabotage the application entirely.
This is actually a common misconception. FAFSA requires the parent who provides more than 50% of support to complete the form, regardless of which parent would provide a more advantageous financial picture. Deliberately choosing the "wrong" parent to get more aid could lead to verification issues and potential penalties for misrepresentation.
Update: I called my child's prospective college financial aid office, and they recommended I start a completely new FAFSA application as the contributing parent. They said it's better than trying to modify his abandoned application. They also suggested I keep all receipts and documentation showing I provide most of the support (housing, food, clothing, etc.) in case we get selected for verification. Apparently, this situation is pretty common with divorced parents. Thanks everyone for the advice!
Great update! The financial aid office gave you exactly the right guidance. Starting fresh is always cleaner than trying to modify an application someone else began. Good luck with the process!
Smart move calling the school directly! They usually give the best advice since they're the ones who'll actually be processing the aid.
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Just a quick update for everyone experiencing this issue - the Department of Education announced yesterday that they're dedicating additional resources to clear the backlog of SAI calculations for applications with self-initiated corrections. They're prioritizing applications where the correction was processed more than 10 business days ago, so you should see movement soon. You can check the FSA social media accounts for the announcement.
That's actually good news! Just checked their Twitter and saw the announcement. Hopefully this means mine will be processed soon without me having to spend hours trying to get through on the phone.
My daughter had this issue last month and what worked for us was going back into the FAFSA and clicking "Make FAFSA Correction" even though there wasn't anything to correct. We just went through each page, didn't change anything, and resubmitted. Somehow this "pushed" the application through the system and her SAI showed up 2 days later. Might be worth trying!
That's a really interesting workaround! I'm a bit nervous about making any changes since the DoE already initiated their own correction, but at this point I might try anything. Did you have to re-sign with the FSA ID when you resubmitted?
Yes, both my daughter and I had to re-sign with our FSA IDs even though we didn't make any actual changes. I think that's what triggered the system to take another look at the application. It was completely stuck before that.
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Update on my situation - my corrections finally processed after 12 days total, and I noticed something weird. The first school I added showed up in my account right away, but the other two took an extra day to appear. So you might want to check again in 24 hours after you first see movement in your account.
That's really helpful to know! I'll keep checking daily. Did you get any email notification when it processed or did you just have to keep logging in to check?
This whole 2025-2026 FAFSA rollout has been a mess! My nephew's corrections took 2 weeks, my daughter's took 9 days, and my corrections took 4 days. There's ZERO consistency. The financial aid officers at my daughter's college said they're all struggling with the new system too and getting very little guidance from the Dept of Education.
You're right that there's been inconsistency, but it's improving. The Department of Education has added resources to address the backlog, and processing times for simple corrections are starting to stabilize. For anyone reading this thread later, the expected timeframe should be more predictable by late summer.
Ethan Moore
everyone keeps saying "dependency override" but from personal experience, those are INCREDIBLY hard to get approved. i work in a high school guidance office and we help seniors with fafsa every year. out of maybe 25 override requests ive seen in the past 3 years, maybe 5 got approved. schools are super strict about this. honestly? just put the mom's info in, put $0 for her income if she doesnt file US taxes, and move forward. financial aid offices know how to handle international parent situations. its way more common than you think.
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Zara Shah
•While I understand you're trying to simplify things, I'd caution against simply putting $0 for the mother's income without proper documentation. This would almost certainly trigger verification, and if they can't then provide documentation, it could lead to even more delays and potential issues with aid. Better to be upfront and follow the proper channels.
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Ethan Moore
•financial aid verification happens randomly anyway. like half the students i work with get selected no matter what. might as well just put the info in the simplest way and deal with verification if it happens. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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Zara Shah
UpdateI: After researching this further, I want to add something important: For the 2025-2026 FAFSA, there are new rules about who counts as a "contributor" (they don't use "parent" anymore). If his biological father is deceased and his mother is his only living parent, then she would be the contributor whose information is required, regardless of where she lives. One advantage: The new SAI (Student Aid Index) calculation under the simplified FAFSA gives more favorable consideration to single-contributor households, especially with low income. So if his mother in Mexico has minimal income, this might actually work in his favor for aid calculations.
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Sean O'Brien
•I really appreciate this update. We're going to try contacting his mom in Mexico to get her information. Do you know if there are any specific documents we would need from her since she doesn't file US taxes? Would something like proof of her income in pesos be sufficient?
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